December 1998

Composer/baritone saxophonist Manfred Schulze's career has been shaped by his decades-long relative isolation in East Germany. Accordingly, he is a maverick whose music has few discernible antecedents. Viertens: Nummer 12 documents his mid-'80s work with his Blaserquintett (Manfred Hering, Dietmar Diesner and Heiner Reinhardt, reeds; Johannes Bauer, trombone), which integrates incisive notated passages and intriguing improvisational strategies; imagine ROVA with George Lewis sitting in, and you're in the ballpark. Given Schulze's striking concepts and the bristling interplay within his quintet, an update is in order.